


black eyes and broken noses

by meteor-sword (vaenire)



Series: Bakoda Fleet Week 2020 [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: :), Comfort, Kissing, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:34:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25567519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vaenire/pseuds/meteor-sword
Summary: There was a scar above his brow from a stray ember, two parallel inch-long scars near his hairline from a hard won hunt, when the polar leopard they had thought was dead reared its head for one last fight. He pressed a kiss to each of these, slow and sweet as his hand sought out another and another.//Bakoda Fleet Week Day 2: young|old wounds
Relationships: Bato/Hakoda (Avatar)
Series: Bakoda Fleet Week 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1858234
Comments: 10
Kudos: 97
Collections: Bakoda Fleet Week 2020





	black eyes and broken noses

Bato found Hakoda in his quarters after dinner. 

“May I come in?” he asked softly, knowing that even in his worst moods, Hakoda would never deny him entry. 

The Chief waved him in, and Bato came to stand at the foot of his bed, where Hakoda sat hunched forward. 

“How are you feeling?” 

“How can I be feeling?” His voice was rough, and Bato tilted his head with concern, tapping his foot against Hakoda’s to encourage him to look up at him. 

“Sokka has a solid plan,” Bato said, hoping to reassure him. He was worried about the invasion plans the following day. He was worried about the rag tag collection of people Sokka had them rounding up. He was worried about sending the Water Tribe warriors so far behind enemy lines. 

Slowly, Bato brought his hand to Hakoda’s jaw, firmly suggesting for him to look up. There was nothing in his face to bely his turbulent thoughts-- nothing to an untrained eye, at least. The slight tension between his brows, the tightness at the corner of his mouth-- they told Bato everything he needed to know. For Hakoda’s sake, though, he pretended not to read these signs. 

Instead, he pet his thumb over the scar on Hakoda’s chin. A sparring incident decades earlier. 

“Do you remember this?” Bato asked with a quiet smile. 

Hakoda didn’t respond verbally, but the warm exhale from his nose against Bato’s hand gave a semblance of a laugh. 

Bato leaned down and pressed his lips lightly to the old scar as he hand explored, one finger skimming the shell of his ear, over the old piercing in his cartilage that he had let close after Kya passed. He pressed his lips there, too, not needing to say anything about it. 

There was a scar above his brow from a stray ember, two parallel inch-long scars near his hairline from a hard won hunt, when the polar leopard they had thought was dead reared its head for one last fight. He pressed a kiss to each of these, slow and sweet as his hand sought out another and another. 

All scars accounted for, Bato wracked his brain to remember exactly where all Hakoda’s worst bruises had been-- above his temple from when he had gotten ahead of himself during a boat building lesson, below his eye when he’d gotten into a disagreement with another young warrior. 

Bato stifled his laugh against Hakoda’s cheekbone when his hand ran over Hakoda’s nose, feeling the crook in the cartilage he’d all but forgotten about. 

Hakoda wrapped a hand around Bato’s wrist then, but didn’t pull his hand away from his nose. Bato looked at him, and found matching signs of concealed laughter on his face-- his smile lines deepened, eyes squinting slightly. 

“Do you remember that?” Hakoda asked him now, and Bato was relieved by the levity in his voice. 

Bato remembered. They had snuck out as young teenagers, carrying one of Bato’s father’s canoes to the water as quiet as they could in the dead of night to see the phosphorescence they’d heard older warriors talking about. It had been beautiful, and Bato smiled remembering how Hakoda swiped his paddle through the water over and over to watch the swirls of green and blue. 

It had not been as beautiful when they found one the currents that a more experienced paddler would have known to avoid, and suddenly they were torn through a dark ice drift, knocking against the chunks of ice dwarfing their little boat. 

They had panicked, neither of them experienced in how to regain control without their Dads’ guidance, and Bato had tried to maneuver the paddle to somehow direct the boat toward a calmer patch-- it clipped a submerged piece of ice, jumped over the rough water, and popped back into the boat and right into Hakoda’s face. His friend yelled out and clutched his face, and might have cried on the way back to the village (but if he did, Bato claimed it was too dark to see). 

Their parents, and then the rest of the village, realized they were gone and had been searching every nook and cranny of the village common areas and the surrounding tundra for the two boys by the time Bato could navigate them back home, and Kanna hauled Hakoda onto the shore by the collar of his coat. In the lantern light, Bato realized just how much blood had poured over his friend’s mouth and chin, drying in the lining of his anorak. 

So that was Hakoda’s first and worst broken nose, and his nose was still crooked all these years later. It took them a while to be able to laugh about it (at least a month, as that was how long it was before Kanna let Hakoda out of her sight at night again), but they were laughing heartily now. 

Bato silenced the laughter by pressing a kiss to the crook in his nose, then another. Hakoda’s hands grasped Bato’s tunic at his hips, balling his hands in the baggy fabric there and pulling him closer. Bato put a knee on the bed and angled Hakoda’s head upward by the jaw to allow his lips to stay where they were on the bridge of Hakoda’s nose. 

Satisfied that he had not missed a single old wound, Bato pressed his forehead to Hakoda’s. He felt as much as saw Hakoda’s eyes flutter shut, pressing back. His grip on Bato loosened, relaxed, and his shoulders slumped inward minutely. 

“We’re going to lose men tomorrow.” 

Bato breathed against his friend’s cheek. “We may.” 

Hakoda shook his head slightly. “We’re going to. Even if everything goes perfectly.” 

There was no use disagreeing. Bato slid one hand from his lover’s face to feather through his thick hair, callused fingertips rubbing against his scalp. He reluctantly moved from their position, kissed the scar on Hakoda’s chin again. 

There was no new way to tell Hakoda that the men trusted him. That they all fought for the future, for the hope that the world could be a better place for their children. That nothing short of a fireblast to the head or heart could keep Bato from leaving his side. He had told him in every way he could think of. 

So he wouldn’t say it tonight. He tangled his fingers into Hakoda’s hair and kissed his chin again, incrementally closer to his lips than the last one. Another, and another, and he kissed the edge of his lower lip and earned a quiet, broken moan. 

Hakoda gripped the back of Bato’s tunic now, his other hand sliding under the bunched fabric to feel the warmth of Bato’s lower back. Bato smiled against his mouth and slipped his hand not gripping his hair over Hakoda’s shoulder, bracing it on the bed and making Hakoda settle onto his back with Bato over him, straddling his hips. 

And Bato let him lay like that, took in the sight of Hakoda, hand still stubbornly up the back of his tunic, looking to Bato for the next move. 

They weren’t flailing teenagers anymore. No, those wounds had healed even if their marks remained, and new wounds had opened since. But while some uncertainty of their youth never went away, they were certain in themselves and in each other, and, if Tui and La provided, that surety would take them to the end of the war tomorrow. 

**Author's Note:**

> written for day 2 of [bakoda fleet week](https://bakodafleetweek.tumblr.com)
> 
> check out my atla blog [ meteor-sword ](https://meteor-sword.tumblr.com)


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